Toyahdoh opened his eyes.

  They were white. Not glowing like before, but white all the way through, no color at all. The firelight caught them and they looked like river stones worn smooth by years of water. Something moved behind them, deep down, the way clouds drift across a sky you can't quite see the end of.

  He was still sitting cross-legged, hands on his knees, back straight.

  "Lost Child of Esa." His voice was quiet but it filled the lodge. "Come."

  Toyahdoh stood. One motion, smooth, no hands pushing off the ground.

  Colt looked at the white-haired girl in the corner. She watched him but gave nothing away. He looked at Clay.

  Clay's face had gone serious. No grin. No joke waiting behind his teeth. He met Colt's eyes and nodded once.

  "Go," he said, quiet.

  Colt walked forward. His boots were loud on the packed dirt. The fire crackled. Smoke curled up through the hole in the roof. He stopped in front of Toyahdoh, close enough to see the cracks in the paint on his face, the lines around his mouth.

  Those white eyes held on him. Colt had never seen eyes like that on a living man. They should have looked dead, but they didn't. They looked like they were seeing more than what was in front of them.

  "How much do you need?" Toyahdoh asked.

  Colt blinked. "What?"

  "Puha. You came here seeking it. How much?"

  Colt's throat tightened. He hadn't expected the chief to cut straight to it.

  "About five hundred and fifty," he said. "I got maybe six right now."

  "And what will you do with this power?"

  Colt's jaw tightened. The question hit something in him he'd been holding down.

  "Kill 'em," he said. "Every last one of them violet-eyed bastards I can get my hands on."

  His voice came out harder than he meant it to. His hands had curled into fists at his sides and he hadn't noticed until now.

  "They killed my pa." The words burned coming up. "Put an arrow through my brother's chest, destroyed our cabin. And that camp out there—" He jerked his head toward where the bruise hung in the sky, even though he couldn't see it through the lodge walls. "They're buildin' somethin'. I ain't gonna sit here and wait for 'em to finish."

  He was breathing hard. His eyes stung but he wouldn't blink.

  Clay shifted behind him. Colt heard his brother's boots scrape the dirt, felt him move closer. Not saying anything. Just there.

  The white-haired girl had gone still in her corner. Her blue eyes were fixed on Colt now, and something had changed in her face. Not pity. Something harder. Like she knew exactly what he was talking about.

  Toyahdoh watched him through those white eyes. The fire crackled and popped. Smoke rose.

  “You carry much anger,” the chief said.

  He watched Colt for a long breath.

  “Anger is like fire. You use fire to warm your lodge. You use it to cook your food. Fire used right, will keep you alive.”

  His eyes stayed steady on Colt.

  “But if you leave fire alone,if you do not control it, it does not stay small. It takes what is near. It climbs. It eats.”

  He lifted a hand, palm down, like he was pressing something back into the earth.

  “Fire will burn your soul until it is black.”

  Colt swallowed. His throat was tight.

  "Someone told me you might be able to help," he said. "That puha you mentioned."

  Toyahdoh was quiet for a moment. Then he turned and walked toward the fire, his back to Colt. The flames threw his shadow long across the dirt floor.

  "Do you know who Esa is, Lost Child?"

  Colt shook his head. "No, sir."

  "Esa is the Wolf. The first one. He walked this land before the mountains rose and the rivers cut their paths." Toyahdoh's voice had changed. Slower now. Like he was reciting something he'd said a thousand times. "He shaped the world with his paws. He breathed life into the first people. And when he was done, he gave them a gift."

  "What gift?"

  "Puha." Toyahdoh turned back to face him. "The breath of creation. The light that lives in all things. Esa did not keep it for himself. He shared it with the land, with the animals, with his children. It flows through the rivers. It grows in the trees. It beats in the hearts of those who know how to listen."

  Colt's brow furrowed. "So it's everywhere? Just floatin' around?"

  "It is in everything. But most do not see it. Most cannot touch it." Toyahdoh stepped closer. "You have seen it, though. When I drew the sickness from the bear. When I passed the wave through my people."

  "That white light," Colt said. "That was Puha."

  "Yes."

  Colt looked at his hands. He thought about the violet crystals he'd been pulling out of dead ninjas. The way they glowed. The way they felt when he absorbed them, like swallowing something that didn't belong inside him.

  "The ninjas got somethin' like it," he said. "Them crystals. Shinki."

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  Toyahdoh's white eyes narrowed.

  "Shinki is Puha that has been twisted. Corrupted. Taken by force and bent to serve darkness." His voice had gone hard. "The shadow warriors do not share. They do not give. They take and take until there is nothing left. They are a sickness, and they spread."

  "So it's the same thing? Just.. bad?"

  "A river and a flood are both water," Toyahdoh said. "One gives life. The other drowns."

  Colt let that sit for a second. His head was spinning, trying to make it all fit together.

  "Can you teach me?" he asked. "How to use it? The Puha?"

  Toyahdoh studied him. Those white eyes moved across Colt's face, slow and careful.

  "You are a Lost Child of Esa," he said. "The blood of the Wolf runs in you, even if you did not know it. You have the right to learn." He paused. "But Puha is not a weapon you pick up and swing. It is a path. And the path is long."

  "I ain't got time for long," Colt said. "That army out there ain't gonna wait."

  "Then you will have to walk faster than most."

  Colt met those white eyes. He didn't look away.

  "Tell me what I gotta do."

  Toyahdoh turned his head toward Clay.

  “Esa had a younger brother. Isapa. The Coyote.”

  Clay backed up a step. His shoulders hit the lodge wall behind him.

  “He carried anger too. Like yours.” Toyahdoh’s white eyes stayed on Clay. “He did not control his fire. He let it climb. Let it eat.” He paused. “And now every world before ours burns because of what he did.”

  Clay’s jaw tightened but he didn’t say anything.

  Toyahdoh looked back at Colt.

  He turned to the table behind him. Clay pots and bundles of dried plants sat in rows. He picked up one of the jugs, pulled the stopper, and poured a small amount of dark liquid into a clay cup. He held it out to Colt.

  “Drink this.”

  Colt took the cup. It was warm in his hands.

  “We will learn if the world will burn with you,” Toyahdoh said. “Or if you will be the one to put it out.”

  Colt lifted the cup to his nose. It smelled sweet. Too sweet. Like rotting fruit with something bitter underneath.

  He looked at the white-haired girl.

  She was still unreadable.

  Colt tipped the cup back and drank it in one swallow. The taste hit the back of his throat and slid down warm. He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

  “Alright. Now what do I—”

  The room pulsed.

  The fire stretched tall, then snapped back. The smoke bent sideways. The walls started to breathe.

  “Hey.” Colt’s voice sounded far away. “What the hell did you give me?”

  He tried to step forward but his legs didn’t work right. The ground tilted. Toyahdoh’s white eyes split into four, then eight, then smeared across his vision like paint in water.

  He heard Clay shout something but the words broke apart before they reached him.

  Then the lodge was gone.

  He was standing on the plains.

  The plains stretched out under a white sky. No sun. No clouds. Just light coming from everywhere at once, so bright it washed out the shadows.

  Colt turned in a circle. Grass to the horizon in every direction. No trees. No mountains. No bruise in the sky.

  He was alone.

  “Show me what you are.”

  Toyahdoh’s voice came from behind him. Colt spun but no one was there. The voice had no source. It just was.

  Movement to his left.

  Ninjas. A dozen of them, stepping out of the grass like they’d been there all along. Black cloth. Violet eyes. The same ones from the crater. The same ones who’d killed Pa.

  Colt reached for his revolver. It was there. He pulled it and the weight felt good in his hand.

  Power surged through him. It came up from the ground, through his boots, into his legs and chest and arms. More than he’d ever felt. His whole body hummed with it.

  The first ninja charged. Fast.

  Colt shot him in the face. The body dropped and violet light poured out of it, streaming into his chest. The power doubled.

  Two more came at him from the right. He put them down with two shots. The light flooded in again. Tripled.

  He holstered the gun and pulled his bowie. He wanted to feel it.

  The next ninja swung a blade at his head. Colt ducked under it, drove the knife into the ninja’s gut, and ripped sideways. Blood sprayed across the grass. The violet light hit him before the body finished falling.

  More came. He killed them all.

  His arms didn’t get tired. His hands didn’t shake. Every swing landed where he meant it to. Every dodge came easy. The power kept building with each kill, stacking on top of itself until he felt like he could tear the sky open with his bare hands.

  The last ninja fell. Colt stood in the middle of the bodies, breathing hard, covered in blood that wasn’t his.

  “You have won.” Toyahdoh’s voice again. “It is done.”

  Colt looked at his hands. The power was still there, thrumming under his skin. His heart was pounding but not from fear. From wanting more.

  “More,” he said.

  He hadn’t meant to say it out loud.

  More ninjas rose from the grass. Twenty this time. Colt grinned and went to meet them.

  He moved through them like wind through wheat. The bowie opened throats and bellies and chests. The power kept coming. Kept growing. The hole that Pa’s death had left started to fill with it.

  “You have enough.” Toyahdoh’s voice was quieter now. “Stop.”

  Colt didn’t stop. He killed the last five in a blur and stood there panting, waiting for the next wave.

  A figure stepped out of the light.

  Gold armor. Golden mask. The general from the camp. The one running the whole damn operation.

  Colt’s grip tightened on the knife. This was the one. This was what he wanted.

  He charged without thinking. The general raised a blade but Colt was faster now, stronger, full of more power than he knew what to do with. He got inside the general’s guard and drove the bowie into his throat. Twisted. Ripped it free.

  The body hit the grass.

  Colt stood over it, chest heaving. The power surged again, bigger than all the others combined. It filled every part of him until there was no room for anything else.

  And he still wanted more.

  “There is no one left.” Toyahdoh spoke.

  Colt looked up.

  Three figures stood at the edge of the field. Clay. The white-haired girl. Toyahdoh.

  “What will you take now?”

  The power pulsed inside him. It wanted to keep going. It didn’t care that the fight was over. It didn’t care that these were his people.

  They doubted you. The thought rose up from somewhere deep. They have what I need.

  Colt took a step toward them.

  Clay’s face changed. Not anger. Fear. He was afraid of his own brother.

  The white-haired girl stepped back.

  Colt took another step. The power sang in his blood. Just a little more. Just enough to fill the hole all the way.

  He raised the knife towards Clay.

  Something caught his eye. His reflection in the blade. The face looking back at him had violet eyes.

  Colt stopped.

  He looked at Clay. At the fear in his brother’s face. At the girl backing away. At Toyahdoh watching with those white eyes, waiting to see what he’d do.

  The power screamed at him to take it. To finish it. To never stop.

  Colt’s hand shook. The knife felt heavier than it had a second ago.

  He looked at Clay again. His brother. The only family he had left. And Clay was scared of him.

  Colt was scared of him.

  The knife slipped from his fingers. It hit the grass without a sound.

  His knees went next. He hit the ground hard, the impact jarring up through his thighs. The power was still there, still clawing at him, but something else was breaking through now. Something he’d been holding down since Pa stopped breathing.

  His chest heaved. His eyes burned. He tried to hold it back but it came anyway, ripping out of him in ugly, gasping sobs that shook his whole body.

  He couldn’t see. Couldn’t breathe right. Snot ran down his lip and he didn’t wipe it. He just knelt there in the grass with his fists pressed into the dirt.

  Pa was dead. He was never coming back. And Colt had almost—

  He sucked in air but it came out as another sob. Then another.

  He didn’t know how long it lasted. The power faded. The hunger faded. All that was left was the hollow place in his chest and the salt on his face and his brother’s boots appearing in front of him.

  Clay didn’t say anything. He just dropped down and put a hand on the back of Colt’s neck and pressed his forehead into his.

  The plains dissolved.

  Colt opened his eyes.

  He was on his knees in the lodge. The fire crackled in the pit. Smoke curled up through the hole in the roof. Toyahdoh stood in front of him, those white eyes looking down.

  Colt’s breath came ragged. His face was wet. He wiped his cheek with the back of his hand and it came away slick.

  “Rise, Child of Esa.”

  Colt’s legs didn’t want to work. He got one foot under him, then the other, and pushed himself up. His thighs burned like he’d been running for miles.

  Toyahdoh turned his head toward Clay.

  “Come.”

  Clay crossed the room. He ducked under Colt’s arm and pulled it across his shoulders, taking some of the weight.

  “You good?” he whispered.

  Colt’s throat was raw. “Yeah.” He swallowed. “Yeah, I’m good.”

  Toyahdoh stepped closer. He raised both hands and placed them on Colt’s shoulders.

  Those white eyes began to glow.